Palmyra native Katie Schreckengast is Miss Pennsylvania 2017. Schreckengast started competing in pageants when she was 13-years-old, this September she will represent the Keystone state competing in Miss America. (Photo: Michael K. Dakota, Lebanon Daily)Buy Photo

“That is the message I’ll be spreading throughout my year, talking about my adoption story and how positive and incredible it was for me,” she said. “Whenever I do talk about my adoption story I always have people come up to me in tears and telling me their story.”

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Palmyra native Katie Schreckengast is Miss Pennsylvania 2017. Schreckengast started competing in pageants when she was 13-years-old, this September she will represent the Keystone state competing in Miss America. (Photo: Michael K. Dakota, Lebanon Daily)

Because of the adoption stories others have shared with her she believes adoption isn’t talked about as openly or as often as it should be.

“I want to share my story throughout my year just so that people understand that just because you’re an adopted family doesn’t make you any less of a family,” she said. “Every single adoption story is different and mine has been so positive and wonderful.”

After being adopted, Schreckengast, 20 and a graduate of Palmyra Area High School, did a sort of adopting of her own.

Jim Deimler, owner of Talk of the Town Hairstylists, 333 Cumberland St., Lebanon, has been doing Schreckengast’s hair for as long as she can remember.

“When I was little for some reason I started calling him Uncle Jim because I guess I felt like he was part of the family,” Schreckengast said. “Since then he has really assumed the role of my uncle.”

While Deimler isn’t a blood relative to the Schreckengast family, he has been Schreckengast’s advocate and supporter throughout her life.

“I recognize that not every young adult my age has had someone like that who has relentlessly supported them no matter what they needed, and believed in them 100 percent all the time,” she said. “I’m very grateful to have him in my life.”

“I started because of my Uncle Jim because he had been a volunteer (with the organization) for more than 50 years and he said, ‘Katie, I think you should try this out. I’ll help you out. We’ll work on interview together, and I’ll buy you your first gown,’” Schreckengast said. “He was my support system going into this because my family had no idea what pageantry was.”

Schreckengast was 13 years old when Deimler introduced her to the Miss America’s Outstanding Teen program, what Schreckengast calls the “little sister” program to the Miss America organization.

“The ‘Toddlers in Tiaras’ television show was huge at that time, so we were all a little bit scared when he said ‘pageant,’” Schreckengast said. “But he supported me the whole way, and my parents were incredible. They were a little freaked out by it, but they said I could give it a try, and I loved it.”

Her first pageant was at the Hershey Area Playhouse where she said she met empowered young women from across the state.

“That’s really what prompted me to continue my journey in pageantry,” she said.

Schreckengast won her second local pageant, then competed in Miss America’s teen system for four years before eventually winning the title of 2013 Miss Pennsylvania’s Outstanding Teen.

“I’ve already won a state title at this kind of a level, but I did that when I was still with the teen program,” she said.

Schreckengast then competed at Miss America's Outstanding Teen competition in Orlando, Florida. She did not win, and serving her stint as Miss Pennsylvania’s Outstanding Teen, she went to college at Penn State for three years.

“This is my first year back in the system,” she said. “This past January was when I won the title of Miss Central Pennsylvania, and that was my first Miss title before Miss Pennsylvania.”

Since she won the title, Schreckengast will take a year off from college to fulfill her duties as Miss Pennsylvania. She is working on a degree in Broadcast Journalism at Penn State.

Competing in pageants does not add to the stress of her everyday life, Schreckengast said.

“The great part about it is it makes you well-rounded in every single aspect of your life, so it’s not necessarily adding an extra layer on top of what I had already been doing with my life,” she said. “It’s just perfecting the things I was doing – making sure that I’m eating healthy, making sure that I’m exercising and making sure that I’m up on current events, which as a broadcast journalism major is something I’m already doing.”

Competing in the pageants has helped her finance college.

“For Miss Pennsylvania I won an $8,500 scholarship,” Schreckengast said. “During my years competing in the teen program I made more than $10,000 toward my college education, and I was still in high school at the time.”

In all her years with the Miss America organization, Schreckengast said she never experienced cattiness or extreme competitiveness among the other contestants.

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Palmyra native Katie Schreckengast is Miss Pennsylvania 2017. Schreckengast started competing in pageants when she was 13-years-old, this September she will represent the Keystone state competing in Miss America. (Photo: Michael K. Dakota, Lebanon Daily)

“That speaks volumes about the Miss America organization,” she said. “It truly is a group of young women that want to lift each other up and empower each other.”

Her favorite part of the competition is the talent portion.

“I’m a member of the Penn State Blue Band – I’m an alto saxophone player,” she said. “So I’ll be representing Penn State Blue Band on (the Miss America) stage, and I’ll be playing my dad’s alto saxophone, so it’s very special to me and I really look forward to that moment.”

The Miss America pageant will be held Sept. 11 in Atlantic City, and Schreckengast said she is ready for it.

“The reality that I’m actually given this chance to achieve what I’ve been dreaming about my entire life – I get emotional about it because I can’t believe that it’s actually happening to me,” she said. “I’m so ready to embrace the opportunity and give 199 percent going into this competition.”